Vote for the Issues or the Party?

When selecting a candidate to vote for in a particular election, what is more important: political party or issues?

Several candidates around the country have placed TV commercials that do not mention any party. They focus on the issues that they see as important to their voters.

Here are a few candidates doing it:

• Joe Donnelly running in Indiana for Congress
• Stephanie Herseth running in South Dakota for Congress
• Blanche Lincoln running in Arkansas for Senator
• Alex Sink running in Florida for Governor

I have seen commercials for each of these candidates. It seems to be appreciated by the audience. It was not even noticeable that no political party was mentioned in the ad, except they were introduced as following the trend.

If the issues are more important than the party, I would like to see all political ads in any election campaign following this commercial format. This gives the candidate time to talk about his or her stand on the issues, and it gives the voters a chance to get to know a little about the candidate, almost personally.

Maybe this is taking the politics out of political elections, but I don't think that's so bad right now.